Alumni News

Alexandria (Alex) Moore (UM EEB M.S. 2013; School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, Yale University Ph.D. 2018)

Alex Moore began a postdoctoral fellowship at the American Museum of Natural History, New York City, in July 2018. She recently completed her Ph.D. at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies where her research focused on how predator-prey interactions impact the health and functioning of wetland ecosystems. At AMNH, she is expanding on the work she did at Yale by branching out into new wetland ecosystems while exploring the cultural implications of habitat restoration and conservation.

“I am currently developing a research project that focuses on two complementary areas: 1. How the ecological community (species identities and predator-prey interactions) impacts ecosystem functioning in coastal wetlands in Hawaii/American Samoa with implications for restoration and conservation; 2. How the biocultural values of the local communities associated with the landscape can help inform restoration/conservation practice by including indigenous knowledge and values.”

Last year, as an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology Department, Moore taught two courses: Conservation Biology and Biodiversity, Conservation, and Social Change. She’s currently on a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship through 2021, which puts her teaching on hiatus.

Moore was in the Frontiers Master’s Program during her time at the University of Michigan. “Prior to my time at Michigan, I had no research experience and little exposure to the internal dynamics of academia,” Moore said. “The MS program gave me the time and experience I needed to define the research I wanted to do and identify the types of spaces in which I could be most impactful.”  

When asked who was especially significant to her during her years at U-M, Moore credits “Tom Duda, for providing formative and foundational experiences in research planning/execution and mentorship, and all of the EEB admin staff behind the scenes (especially Bethany Christoff and Gail Kuhnlein) for being steadfast supporters throughout my time.”

At AMNH, she is working closely with several research scientists, including Dr. Eleanor Sterling and Dr. Mary Blair.

“My favorite thing about working at AMNH is that I have the freedom to develop and conduct the research I want to do while also working with students of all age groups to help increase diversity in STEM.”

Image: Alex Moore at a field site at Ho'okipa Beach Park, Maui, Hawaii.

Theresa Wei Ying Ong (U-M EEB MS 2011, Ph.D. 2017) begins as assistant professor of agroecology in July 2019 at Dartmouth College. She is the first graduate of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology’s Frontiers Master’s Program to secure a faculty position.  

Ong will be working in the Department of Environmental Studies, where she will teach a field agroecology course based at the campus farm, a course about the science and politics of food, and a coupled human-natural systems theory course.

She’s interested in researching the concept of agro-ecological transitions. Her current research seeks “to understand the network stability of alternative Chinatown food trade systems, and document and quantify how urban and peri-urban gardens arose and responded to episodes of environmental, social or economic crisis in the deep and more recent past.” Peri-urban gardens are generally on the fringes of urban areas.

“My experience as a Frontiers student and as a Ph.D. student will definitely help prepare me for this new role,” she said. “I'm excited to incorporate a lot of the lessons I learned as a graduate student teaching courses like Field Ecology, Agroecology, and Practical Botany to students at U-M. I think that the Frontiers program in particular helped introduce me to a broad range of environmental issues and their intersectionality.

She is very grateful for the support system of Frontiers students and alumni who have always been there for her, “whether that meant helping me to prepare talks, sharing tips on interviews, or brainstorming negotiation strategies. The first person to forward this job to me was a Frontiers student, and I am so grateful that I have this network of people to rely on!

“Thanks especially to my advisor John Vandermeer and also Ivette Perfecto, who always taught me to think outside the box. I couldn't have done it without their incredible support throughout the years.”

She is looking for new graduate students so if any Frontiers are interested in starting a Ph.D. in agroecology at Dartmouth, please contact her at theresa.w.ong@dartmouth.edu.

Prosanta Chakrabarty (U-M EEB Ph.D. 2006) was named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in the Section on Biological Sciences. In 2018, the lifetime honor of Fellow was bestowed upon 416 AAAS members in recognition of their extraordinary achievements in advancing science applications that are deemed scientifically or socially distinguished.

Chakrabarty, associate professor in the Louisiana State University Department of Biological Sciences and the curator of Ichthyology in the LSU Museum of Natural Science, was elected for his distinguished contributions to evolutionary biology, focusing on the bioluminescent systems and historical biogeography of freshwater fishes, and for effectively communicating science to the public.

“For me the honor is incredible, it means to me that the work I’ve done, both scientifically and in terms of outreach and service, are meaningful to my community,” Chakrabarty said. “It would not have happened without my time at Michigan.”

The Fellows were recognized at the 2019 AAAS Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. During a Fellows Forum on Feb. 16, they were presented with an official certificate and the AAAS Fellows’ gold and blue rosette pin, the colors that represent the fields of science and engineering, respectively.

This year’s Fellows, who represent a broad swath of scientific disciplines, were selected for diverse accomplishments that include pioneering research, leadership within their field, teaching and mentoring, fostering collaborations and advancing public understanding of science.

AAAS’ annual tradition of recognizing leading scientists as Fellows dates to 1874. Since then, AAAS has honored distinguished scientists such as astronomer Maria Mitchell, elected a Fellow in 1875; inventor Thomas Edison (1878); chemist Linus Pauling (1939); and computer scientist Grace Hopper (1963). Four of the 2018 Nobel Prize laureates – James Allison, Arthur Ashkin, Frances Arnold and George Smith – are AAAS elected Fellows.

The full list of 2018 Fellows was published in the Nov. 29, 2018 issue of Science.

Jen-Pan Huang (U-M EEB Ph.D. 2015) is a tenure track assistant research fellow at the Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan. Huang will be studying biodiversity patterns and conservation in beetles and lichens. His research focuses on the spatial and temporal distributions of different species and populations, and how and why the distribution patterns vary across organismal groups. The results are critical to understanding how new species emerged and to inform conservation policy by identifying unique and endemic species. He begins the new position in January 2019. Huang, and the rest of those featured here are alumni from the lab of Professor L. Lacey Knowles.

Katharine Suding (UM EEB Ph.D. 1999) received the prestigious Robert H. MacArthur Award at the Ecological Society of America Annual Meeting in New Orleans, La. in August 2018. The award honors an established ecologist in mid-career for meritorious contributions to ecology, in the expectation of continued outstanding ecological research.

Suding, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Colorado’s Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, is a leader in community ecology. She applies empirical and theoretical approaches to address fundamental and applied problems faced by ecological communities in today’s changing world. She has impacted the field of ecology not only through her numerous publications, but also through the students and postdocs she has mentored, and through her leadership in interdisciplinary collaborations.

Suding’s work in grassland ecosystems demonstrated how species’ traits affect the persistence and abundance of species in response to environmental stressors, many of which are related to human activities such as nitrogen deposition, grazing and changes in rainfall. Her work in alpine systems has revealed the mechanisms by which alpine communities respond to climate change, particularly the role of plant-soil feedbacks. Her research focuses on community assembly and response to environmental perturbations, and the implications for restoration and management.

Her many mentees now have successful careers in academic institutions, and in agencies and non-governmental organizations doing practical work in restoration and landscape management. She has contributed to over 120 articles and co-edited two books, and has been an active leader in the National Science Foundation’s-Long Term Ecological Research network. She has spread the curiosity that feeds her own research to students and collaborators, emphasizing the need to combine basic and applied research in our changing world.

Suding’s advisor in ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Michigan was Professor Deborah Goldberg. “She was a fabulous advisor,” said Suding. “She taught me how to critically think and write, lessons I try to carry forward to my students.” Suding also loved working at the Matthaei Botanical Gardens, where she said the staff is “super helpful” and that it was “so nice to have a place close to campus where you can conduct research.”

“Katie is a brilliant ecologist, whose special strength is an ability to take rather vague ecological concepts and make them operational so that we can actually test them,” said Goldberg. “She was a joy to have as a graduate student in the lab and it has been thrilling to see her career just soar over the last two decades.”

You’ve got six minutes to dispel common misconceptions people have about evolution – and, go! That’s the task EEB alumnus Prosanta Chakrabarty (UM EEB Ph.D. 2006) chose to tackle at the TED2018 conference in Vancouver, Canada in April.

Chakrabarty’s presentation on understanding evolution is the headlined talk on TED.com today, Friday, June 15, 2018 – its public debut. His previous TED talk from 2016, “Clues to prehistoric times, found in blind cave fish” has surpassed one million views. “Having that platform is amazing – there are very few ways for a scientist like me to reach that many people.” He hopes his evolution talk will have the same kind of reach.

About 30 percent of TED talks get posted, so Chakrabarty said “I feel kind of lucky, this is my second talk going online.” He doesn’t know what the review process entails. He said there are really good talks that don’t make it and some dull ones that do and joked maybe his is one of the dull ones. We doubt that.  

Most people are aware that, for some, evolution remains a controversial topic, with people who believe in evolution (including the vast majority of scientists) and those who don’t, for a number of reasons. There’s a long history of this divided thinking in America. He thinks part of the reason people don’t accept evolution is that they think it is something it’s not, like anti-religion.

He notes that some pop culture references aren’t helpful, such as the iconic image that begins with a monkey on the left that slowly transforms into an upright human. “That’s not how it happens,” he said. “The impression is you were a monkey before, but it’s not like that. We share a common ancestor with other primates, most recently with chimpanzees.” In fact, he begins the video by asking and answering an often asked query: if we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?

“When we teach evolution at the university level, students are at a disadvantage because all they know is Darwin or these pop culture references.”

At TED2018, Chakrabarty spoke to an audience of over 1,000, many who paid between $10,000 - 25,000 to attend. This didn’t add extra pressure for him because in contrast to many of the speakers who are interested in investors for their new idea or product, Chakrabarty is there as a scientist who studies fish and evolution, just trying to open minds.

 “I don’t get nervous teaching in front of students, or talking about my science, but the TED talks are performances. As a scientist, I don’t know how to do that.” He practiced – a lot – because he wanted to be precise with his language and didn’t want to “mess up.” He was lucky to have had the experience before (at TED). He wanted to present his subject in the most non-confrontational way he could and look as non-threatening as possible, so he didn’t go with his “I-mean-business look,” which involves a sport coat. He thinks his thick wool sweater made him look more like Mr. Rogers.

As a Senior TED Fellow who is mentoring the new class of fellows, he tried to be a good example by heeding his own advice. Regarding public speaking, he said “there are a lot harder things to do, like raising children or going into a cave. There are scarier things we’ve all done that have much bigger consequences than speaking to a few dozen or even 1,000 people. I always tell people, you don’t look nervous even if you are, unless you’re stumbling on your words, or saying ‘um.’ Think about what you want to say and how you want to say it. Practice – and that’s it.”

“The only explanation I find scientifically acceptable for explaining the diversity of life that I see around me, and the fossil forms I find beneath me, is that they are all a product of evolution,” he said. “There is also no way to explain our big brains, weak hearts and bad backs, without seeing humans as part of that process as well.”

Watch Chakrabarty's TED talk on evolution>>

What started as M. Jahi Chappell’s (UM EEB Ph.D. 2009) doctoral dissertation is now the book “Beginning to End Hunger: Food and the Environment in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, and Beyond,” published January 2018, by the University of California Press.

“Beginning to End Hunger” is about Belo Horizonte, home to 2.5 million people and the site of one of the world’s most successful food security programs. Since the 1993 founding of its Municipal Secretariat of Food and Nutritional Security (SMASAN), the city has sharply reduced malnutrition, and has become an inspiration for Brazil’s renowned (and currently endangered) Zero Hunger programs. The secretariat’s work with local family farmers shows how food security, rural livelihoods and healthy ecosystems can be supported together. In this convincing case study, Chappell establishes the importance of holistic approaches to food security, suggests how to design successful policies to end hunger, and lays out strategies for enacting policy change. The book presents next steps toward achieving similar reductions in hunger and food insecurity elsewhere in the developed and developing worlds.

“Two key parts of the book are that (a) it's completely technically possible to end world hunger right now – what is most needed is social change, and (b) large-scale social change can happen, but it takes years – even decades – of work to bear fruit, and you never know exactly when that fruit will come,” said Chappell.

Historical context

“I think with the many upheavals we see in the world right now, even though it has caused a lot of people to feel pretty grim about the future, we need to remember that change is never, ever one-directional,” he said. “For example, what we see in Brazil is that radical ideas first voiced in the 1920s led to innovative national food security programs in the 1940s, which were then shut down as Brazil went through political upheaval, and more than one dictatorship. But incredibly strong social movements, and plans for change, sprang out of the 1964-1985 dictatorship in Brazil, leading to city and national food security programs, like the one I studied in Belo Horizonte, and a huge reduction in poverty in Brazil over the past decades.”

Can we end hunger?

“We have the technical tools, and many of the political tools, to end hunger already. We have movements around the world agitating for the kind of political systems change needed; we could see surprising and ‘sudden’ successes in the next 10 years; or it might take another 50. But what's important is that people know it's possible, so that we can organize to demand and design the end to world hunger that is certainly possible.”

“We can solve some of the most pernicious problems we face – like world hunger, even climate change – but it will require getting organized across the lines of class, geographic area, sector, creed and color. When it's typical for academics to march not just for science or about climate change but also to plan and march with farmers and workers for labor rights and a strong social safety net – and for farmers and workers to march with us for science – then we'll know we're going to make progress.”

Amazing results

Belo Horizonte saw 50-70 percent reductions in infant mortality and malnutrition, 33 percent reduction in hospitalization due to diabetes, and a 25 percent increase in consumption of fruits and vegetables. A key message is “that the way they did this was to treat the right to food as an essential right for the city to support, and did so in a very holistic way,” said Chappell. “Legal rights, physical and economic food access, local political participation, employment, and support for small local family farmers were all part of what they did to dramatically reduce hunger.”

Chappell continued, “In a real way, this was the result of organizing going back to the 1980s, with social movements for the poor, for rural workers and farmers, for laborers, coming together with allies in academia and politics, to design a joint plan to guarantee a whole suite of social rights that are inextricably connected: from the right to food to the right to land, clean water, affordable housing and direct citizen input on government agendas.

Honored and humbled

Chappell was “honored and humbled by the trust and support the city officials leant” in allowing him into their offices, and by the local farmers who allowed him to gather data on their property. “I hope that the book gives back by helping them maintain support for their amazing food security programs, and perhaps even improve and expand them. While national politics in Brazil are currently grim, signs are that Belo Horizonte’s programs have the support of their new mayor.”

What he does

Chappell became a senior research fellow (akin to associate professor in U.S.) in August 2016 at the Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience (CAWR) at Coventry University, United Kingdom. In this position, he carries out grant-writing, helps supervise graduate students, conducts research and gives talks about his work to the general public and at professional conferences. Working at CAWR stands out to him due to “a shared understanding that researchers’ partnership and allyship with social movements and participatory work with community groups makes our science more effective, and more likely to lead to the kind of deep changes we need to get to environmental sustainability and social justice.”

What allowed this book to happen, Chappell said, is “the fact that U-M EEB, and John Vandermeer and Jerry Smith in particular, supported me doing a dissertation that was significantly grounded in political science and political ecology, alongside conservation biology. I'm incredibly thankful to the two of them, as well as my other committee members – Ivette Perfecto and Maria Carmen Lemos at U-M, and Cecilia Rocha and Rodrigo Matta Machado from Ryerson University and Federal University of Minas Gerais.”

Recent podcasts featuring Chappell:

Delicious Revolution Podcast. “Episode #52: Jahi Chappell on Beginning to End Hunger.” April 10, 2018

Real Food Reads Podcast. “Beginning to End Hunger: M. Jahi Chappell | Ep. 19.” March 5, 2018

Billed as “a hopeful documentary about fighting with your whole heart, ‘UNFRACTURED’ follows introspective biologist and mother Sandra Steingraber (U-M Ph.D. Biology 1989) as she reinvents herself as an outspoken activist and throws herself into an environmental war that many believe is unwinnable.

“Hailed as a ‘toxic avenger’ by Rolling Stone, Steingraber quickly emerges as a leader of New York’s biggest grassroots movement in decades. Determined to win an uncompromising battle with the oil and gas industry, Steingraber decides she must fight with her whole heart – devoting all her time, energy, and money to the cause. But as the film opens, her personal life is thrown into crisis when her husband Jeff begins having one stroke after another. She knows her family needs her at home, but Steingraber can’t stop – not until she and her allies win a state-wide ban on fracking.”

In contrast to her 2010 documentary, “Living Downstream,” with its meticulously planned storyline, “UNFRACTURED” was shot in an observational style, known in the industry as cinéma-vérité. The filmmaker, Chanda Chevannes, followed Steingraber around in the final year of the build-out of a social movement to try to ban fracking.

“I was the unofficial scientist in residence,” Steingraber said. “I was told ‘we have a press conference in Albany and here’s the messaging. We want you to deliver the science.’ I was the chick singer in the band as I see it.”

No one knew how the story would end so the filmmaker was taking a big risk – it could have all been for nothing. Many people took a big risk and fought with their whole heart, she said. People featured in the film took early retirement so they had time to fight or took out a second mortgage on their home to fight.

“When the land all around is leased to the gas industry, you feel like you’re going to have to move or fight,” Steingraber said. Many in their group had left their homes in Pennsylvania because they saw what happened. “They settled on the border of Pennsylvania, almost like environmental refugees. People who hadn’t moved invited us to see the sites. It was an intense four years.”

Through it all, Chevannes and Steingraber got to know each other quite well. Despite Chevannes being 20 years younger and their different backgrounds, they think alike, sometimes finishing each other’s sentences. Chevannes is Canadian, mixed-race, and was raised in Toronto – a city that is the economic and cultural hub of the country. Steingraber is American, white, and was raised in Pekin, Ill. – a small town surrounded by industry and agriculture. “I’m always impressed when I see the rough cut of the film and the camera’s eye lingers on something I also noticed like blades of grass or a pattern of a chain link fence.”

“It’s almost like she’s filming this large operatic conflict between the people of New York and the gas industry. What’s the role of water? Is it life or a club to smash the bedrock apart? Are we going to weaponize our drinking water?” The film tackles these huge, profound questions – there’s not a neat storyline.

The film takes viewers to the hospital where Steingraber would say goodbye to her husband at 6 a.m. because they were going to a rally in Albany. “The fight was at a fever pitch, and I used that vulnerability to political advantage," which is why the film opens with Steingraber saying, “Our personal tragedies don’t push the pause button.”

She recognizes that everyone has stuff going on in their lives, but strongly believes “we have to stay to fight the fight.”

The film ends on an exuberant note with the announcement of the fracking ban. NY Governor Andrew Cuomo was convinced to ban fracking in the state on the grounds of the science, which they had worked hard to assemble for him and his commissioner of health.

"A group of musicians had just done a blockade of the driveway of a gas storage company to prevent a truck from entering. We had gotten word that this decision might be coming down and I was trying to follow it on my phone, even as people were risking arrest. All of a sudden, police arrived and made them drop their instruments. Then icy rain was falling, I was trying to scoop these instruments up, guitars and banjoes and drums, I’m running down the road with musical instruments under one arm, deputies yelling at us to disperse and listening to the broadcast of this cabinet meeting in Albany to hear what was happening.

“The camera happened to be there when the announcement came.” Because they were musicians, as they emerged from jail and found out about the fracking ban’s passage, a spontaneous concert broke out.

“We were all kind of dancing, it was an almost dreamlike day. It couldn’t have been more dramatic.”

However, the fight continued because even though the gas industry couldn’t blast the gas out of New York’s bedrock, they wanted to use abandoned salt caverns near Seneca Lake as a large gas storage depot, which would have put drinking water for 100,000 at risk. “It also happened to be located near a summer camp my son attended.” The camp didn’t have a good evacuation plan. By then, Steingraber knew too much about the dangers of underground gas storage and thus, the “We are Seneca Lake” civil disobedience movement began. Steingraber and a number of other activists were arrested, were jailed and released and arrests continued with over 650 arrests altogether.

The decision maker for the gas storage plan wasn’t the governor, it was the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Steingraber got to work as she did to ban fracking, looking at what the science showed and brought that information to public comment periods, gave expert commentary, and helped the public understand the issues so they could write informed commentary. Steingraber and many other independent scientists submitted very critical commentary and the response they got back was “we’re just not looking at that, it’s outside the scope of our review or we don’t think that’s a problem.”

Finally, the gas storage expansion plans on Seneca Lake were cancelled.

Banning fracking is a life-saving effort that protects drinking water, “there’s really demonstrable evidence that fracking is contaminating drinking water,” Steingraber said. Additionally, fracking destroys the bedrock and contributes to climate change.

“The world premiere of “UNFRACTURED” was in Toronto in October 2017. The film opened the Planet in Focus International Environmental Film Festival and took home the festival’s top prize. They just screened at Washington DC’s Environmental Film Festival right after the March For Our Lives. “It was an electric day!” said Chevannes, who will be in Ann Arbor for a question and answer session after the screening, along with Steingraber.

“UNFRACTURED” traveled to Ann Arbor for a free screening at the Michigan Theater April 4, 2018 from 7 – 9 p.m.

Screenings of “UNFRACTURED”

Senay Yitbarek (Ph.D. EEB 2016) and Theresa Ong (Ph.D. EEB 2017) are the first two U-M EEB Frontiers master’s students to graduate with their doctoral degrees from U-M EEB.

“The Frontiers program was like a second family for me at Michigan,” said Ong. “Having a group of people who came from a background similar to my own was invaluable to me as I progressed though the master’s and doctoral programs. I could always count on members of the Frontiers program to understand the difficulties of being a minority in a majority serving institution, and also for just being resources whether it was data analysis, project planning or funding ideas. Everyone in the Frontiers program looks out for each other and that is probably its most important aspect. We want to see each other succeed because any success is a success for us all.”

Ong is an NSF postdoctoral biology research fellow in the area of Broadening Participation of Underrepresented Minorities in Science. As such, “I have the luxury of designing my own project and working with three amazing scientists: Simon Levin, Princeton University, Stacy Philpott, University of California, Santa Cruz, and Brenda Lin, Commonwealth Scientific Industrial Research Organization.”

Her project is an extension of her dissertation work on the complexity of urban agricultural systems. Ong will examine the rate, tempo and patterns of transitions in land-use from vacant lots to urban gardens to urban development projects in California using historical aerial imagery combined with dynamic modeling. She plans to link the transitions to a combination of socioecological drivers including food security, precipitation and income levels.

In an effort to broaden participation of underrepresented minorities in science, Ong will work with a youth group in the Community Action Network called Growing Justice. This group is composed of children of farmworkers who use urban agriculture to supplement low incomes. This area of California is experiencing rapid gentrification, and as a result, many of these families are currently losing their homes and access to urban agriculture. As part of her postdoc, she will share the maps she develops of historical transitions in land-use with Growing Justice, and work with them to better understand what drove land-use transitions in the past in their neighborhoods and how this information may be used in the future to retain land for urban agriculture. 

Senay Yitbarek credits the Frontiers program with exposing him to the rich diversity of research done in ecology and evolution. “My greatest strength, and admittedly weakness, is my interest in a wide range of biological topics and for that reason the Frontiers program within EEB served as a perfect environment.”

Frontiers allowed the young scientist to maintain an open mind while he gained necessary research skills. “This flexible approach eventually led me to find my own path.”

He notes that the Frontiers program signified a major cultural shift within the department. “As part of the first Frontiers cohort, I was fortunate to witness the rapid demographic changes of the graduate student body in the department. Frontiers not only changed the playing field of who gets to do science but has also expanded the types of questions that are being asked.”

Yitbarek gained self-confidence in his ability to do biological research through his coursework and experience in the lab and field. He said his master's thesis project was the single most important factor that prepared him for the Ph.D. program. “My advisor, John Vandermeer, played a crucial role in my development as a scientist. John's enthusiasm got me interested in theoretical ecology, particularly in the spatial dynamics of populations, and under his guidance I was able to develop those skills.

Yitbarek is an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellow in in the area of Broadening Participation of Groups Underrepresented in Biology at the University of California, Berkeley. "This fellowship provides a great degree of intellectual freedom while benefitting from active support by my mentor Mike Boots at UC Berkeley, who is a leading theoretical disease biologist."

Yitbarek’s current research focuses on the evolutionary ecology of multiple infections focusing on how spatial heterogeneities in insect populations modify selection pressures on parasites.

Yitbarek will be partnering with the Biology Scholars Program at UC Berkeley to mentor underrepresented students and guide them in developing independent research projects to prepare them for graduate school. He is hopeful that the pool of underrepresented minority scientists can be connected with academic hiring. "I hope that my outreach work can aid in that process, because I am the direct result of it."
 

Amanda Izzo (Ph.D. 2011) became a senior science writer at the Institute for Disease Modeling (IDM), Seattle, Wash., in August 2016. IDM, part of Intellectual Ventures Global Good initiative, is committed to improving and saving lives in developing countries through the use of quantitative analysis.

Izzo develops scientific content for the global health community, working with researchers to help integrate the science across fields, contributing to the website, learning centers, and keeping the news and blog posts updated.

“I love working at IDM – it’s got the flexibility of working in academia, since we are mostly a research institution. We have a software team that created a big disease model that is constantly getting upgraded, as well as research scientists that work on malaria, tuberculosis, pneumonia, HIV, TB, polio, typhoid and more. It's a lot of fun, the group is great, and my position is brand new so I have a lot of say in how to actually shape it. If you had asked me in grad school if this is where I thought I'd end up, I would have said ‘What? Um, no?’ but I couldn't ask for a better position or a better fit for my interests.”

Izzo is passionate about science communication, and aims to help make science more accessible between fields as well as to the general public.

Read more about Izzo on the IDM team webpage

Some stars just shine more brightly than others. Callie Chappell (B.S. Biology 2016) won the 2016 Christine Psujek Memorial Undergraduate Award for the Program in Biology, which is presented to the graduating senior who submits the best biology Honors thesis in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts at the University of Michigan. In addition, Chappell was selected for the Marshall Nirenberg Award in Life Sciences, a Goldstein LSA Honors Prize, which goes to the top nine seniors (one in each discipline) graduating with Honors. Chappell is the first person to capture both prestigious awards.

In another first, Chappell was accepted to the concurrent undergraduate-graduate studies program, meaning she will complete her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in four years instead of the usual five. She completed her undergraduate Honors thesis in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology working with her advisor, Professor Mark Hunter.

She has submitted her thesis, “Influences of elevated, atmospheric carbon dioxide on population dynamics of the oleander aphid, Aphis nerii, mediated by changing plant chemistry,” for publication to Ecological Entomology as first author.

“Callie has discovered a novel phenomenon – that the toxins that insects store in their bodies, to protect themselves from bird predators, change in concentration and chemical structure when their host plants are grown under elevated concentrations of atmospheric CO2,” said Hunter. “In brief, ongoing changes in our atmosphere are influencing the ability of insects to defend themselves against their enemies. This exciting result has profound implications for both natural communities of plants and insects, and for the management of insect pests that feed on our food and fiber crops.”

Chappell is currently working on her master’s degree and applying to EEB doctorate programs. She’s interested in a career in academia because she loves teaching, research and the scientific community. “Callie is a superstar who has enormous drive, commitment and ability,” added Hunter. “She is one of the smartest and most engaged undergraduates with whom I’ve ever worked.”

Watch for a profile on this rising star in EEB’s fall print newsletter, Natural Selections.

Micaela Martinez-Bakker (U-M EEB Ph.D. 2015) volunteers with Code 7370, a coding school in San Quentin Prison, Calif. The valuable tech skills students learn will help them land jobs when they leave prison and reduce recidivism.

Her three students created a web application for interactive maps that highlight the impact of vaccination against measles, chickenpox and polio. The app also provides data visualizations for influenza reports.

In developing their Disease History Interactive Map app, Martinez-Bakker’s students used data from Project Tycho, a project at the University of Pittsburgh to advance the availability and use of public health data for science and policymaking. Her first set of students graduated and presented their app to the public and potential employers.

Because she’s at Princeton University on the other side of the country, Martinez-Bakker met with her students over Skype. Although the students at San Quentin do not have access to the Internet, they get special permission to Skype periodically with her. Other instructors who Martinez-Bakker is in touch with go into the prison regularly and they pass on information to the students. The students learned to code and created apps even without Internet access.  

"Working with Code 7370 has been an enriching experience,” Martinez-Bakker said. “The students are highly motivated and extremely hard workers. I was incredibly impressed with how quickly the students picked up the epidemiology. The web app they developed will help the public visualize complex data on childhood disease epidemics.

“I got involved with Code 7370 because I am committed to engaging in scientific outreach and helping facilitate upward mobility in marginalized groups. My hope is to continue to help Code 7370 to mentor students in San Quentin.”

Martinez-Bakker is an NSF Postdoctoral Fellow in Biology in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and a postdoctoral affiliate, Global Health Program, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University.

An infectious disease ecologist, her primary interest is the seasonality of infectious diseases; although she is broadly interested in various aspects of disease and population ecology. Her current research focuses on trying to understand the ecological, demographic, and environmental drivers behind seasonal epidemics of early-life infections, including poliomyelitis, measles and chickenpox.

Code 7370 was launched in 2015 by a nonprofit group called The Last Mile to teach computer programming to inmates. The Last Mile was founded five years ago by a San Francisco-based venture capitalist and his wife to help reduce the state’s huge prison population and recidivism by developing job skills. The students learn several computer languages including HTML, JavaScript, CSS and Python. In addition, the curriculum has expanded to include web and logo design and data visualization.

According to The Last Mile, the United States comprises five percent of the world population and 25 percent of the world’s incarcerated population. The nation’s prison population has grown 700 percent since the 1970s, disproportionately affecting African Americans and Latinos. State and federal prison spending is nearly $48 billion annually and the recidivism rate is over 60 percent. The goal is to break the cycle of incarceration and spend tax dollars instead on higher education and on educational opportunities for youth in underserved communities.

The program received extensive media attention including Fox 2 News, USA Today, KQED News, and much more.

Read about Bakker-Martinez’s students

Animal show-offs are sending a loud and clear message to potential mates (“hey baby, look my way”) or potential rivals (“don’t mess with me, man, I’m bad news”). But, why don’t more animals have these “quality signals” such as a male peacock’s brilliant tail feathers or a lion’s flowing mane?

Michael Sheehan (U-M EEB Ph.D. 2012), assistant professor of neurobiology and behavior at Cornell University, and U-M’s Thore J. Bergman, associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and psychology, wrote about how animals use quality signals and social recognition in an invited review that is the cover story in the January – February 2016 issue of the journal Behavioral Ecology.

Animals that lack the quality signals, such as humans, crows and dolphins, likely evolved in smaller social groups where everyone knows each other, according to Sheehan.

“Judging rivals by their ornaments is sort of like judging a book by its cover. You’ll get some information about the book, but you’ll learn much more by reading it,” Sheehan said. “Animals that repeatedly interact with the same individual essentially get a chance to ‘read the book’ and learn about their rivals.”

As species evolved, he said, quality signals and social recognition have been antagonistic, with selection depending on the social structure in which the animals lived. Evolving in small social groups favors social recognition over external signals.

In a troop of baboons, everyone knows who the alpha male is. But Gelada monkeys that live in huge herds in the highlands of Ethiopia carry a bright red chest patch that indicates status. The Gelada chest patch is thought to act like a lion’s mane, advertising the strength of a male to unfamiliar rivals that might challenge him for his pride.

Each form of signaling requires an investment: It takes energy to grow a bigger mane or develop a more flexible vocal system, but social recognition requires more learning, which is energetically costly too. Experiments with fruit flies have shown that flies that had to learn a task died quicker when later placed under stress. The benefits of the signaling system have to outweigh the costs both for senders and receivers as traits co-evolve.

Why do humans lack extravagant peacock-like signals? Why do so many animals not recognize the individuals around them? Sheehan and Bergman suggest that there may be evolutionary trade-off between elaborate quality signals and social recognition. The framework they propose for integrating studies of signals and social recognition provides a road map for future work and helps explain why so many species living in stable groups, such as primates, tend to lack elaborate signaling traits.

Read more from Cornell University

Prosanta Chakrabarty, evolutionary biologist and ichthyologist (Ph.D. EEB 2006), was named one of 21 TED Fellows for 2016. TED is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks.

Chakrabarty is an associate professor and Museum of Natural Science Curator of Fishes at Louisiana State University. TED selects thought leaders and trailblazers in various disciplines from around the world to be TED Fellows. Follow Charkrabarty on Twitter @LSU_FISH.

Prosanta Chakrabarty, evolutionary biologist and ichthyologist (Ph.D. EEB 2006), recently gave a TEDx talk demonstrating the vitality of studies in nature and how 21st century tools can trace Earth’s distant history.

What if two different fish species, living thousands of miles apart from each other, hold the key to Earth’s history? One fish, two fish, red fish, bioluminescent, and blind fish? Chakrabarty, an associate professor and curator of fishes at Louisiana State University, has travelled to over 20 countries in his quest to better understand and chronicle the plethora of fish species that call Earth home. Chakrabarty’s lab research focuses on discovering the relationships between fishes and their habitats to better understand how they evolved. His passion outside the lab focuses on showing students of all ages and backgrounds that exploring the natural world can provide insight and meaning across the blue planet. You can follow him on Twitter @LSU_FISH.

Chakrabarty’s talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by LSU. 

Read the full LSU article

Watch the video on YouTube

Popular Science magazine has named Katia Koelle (Ph.D. 2005), an associate professor at Duke University, one of The Brilliant 10 for 2014.

Each year, Popular Science undergoes a six-month selection process to recognize the most inspired young scientists and engineers in North America – researchers whose ideas will transform the future, according to the magazine.

Koelle models how viruses mutate and spread in order to predict why emerging diseases turn deadly – and how to best contain them. Koelle’s advisor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Michigan was Professor Mercedes Pascual.

After a one-year postdoc at the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics at Pennsylvania State University, she joined the Duke University Biology faculty in 2007.

“People don't usually become scientists expecting fame, glory or to have a line of sneakers named after them,” according to the magazine’s website. “But we at Popular Science believe that scientists are the true celebrities of our time. Their contributions enhance our lives and stretch our imaginations. For the 13th year, Popular Science honors the brightest young minds reshaping science, engineering, and the world.”

We contacted Koelle to find out a little more about her latest adventures. Regarding her work, she said, “most of all, I enjoy the surprises that I encounter. Usually, I go into a project having a clear idea of what I think is going on, and thinking that all it will take is building a mathematical model to provide support for this idea. Most of the time, however, the model shows me that what I think is going on cannot actually be going on, and once I accept this, the model becomes a tool with which to explore alternative hypotheses. It’s this discovery phase that I really enjoy.”  

Two of her current projects focus on flu. “The first focuses on how deleterious (fitness-reducing) mutations affect patterns of influenza’s adaptive evolution. Most mutations are known to be deleterious, but often times when we try to understand (through the use of mathematical models) how viral populations evolve over time, we consider only the role that advantageous mutations play. Although these advantageous mutations are really the genetic basis for viral adaptation, sublethal deleterious mutations circulate extensively in viral populations, and due to genetic linkage, can impact which advantageous mutations can establish and ultimately shape patterns of adaptive evolution. With a former Ph.D. student of mine, David Rasmussen, I am currently finishing up a project that illustrates that a model that incorporates deleterious mutations can reproduce certain key features of influenza’s antigenic evolution, whereas models that neglect to incorporate these deleterious mutations have much greater difficulty in doing so.

“The second project focuses on what happens to circulating influenza subtypes when a new pandemic strain emerges and spreads globally. In some instances, a circulating seasonal flu virus persists through the pandemic period – for example, influenza A/H3N2 was around pre-2009, and is still circulating now. In other instances, a circulating seasonal flu virus is excluded, however, for example influenza A/H1N1 did not persist. I’m currently working on a project that tries to understand these different outcomes using recently developed ecological and evolutionary

“My main career goals are relatively simple: to contribute interesting ideas and useful methods to further our understanding of natural populations and how they change in abundance over time and space. In the context of infectious diseases, it’s a ‘bonus’ to have the opportunity to contribute to a field that is not only theoretically interesting to study but also one which may benefit from your analyses. On a more selfish level, my goal is to continue learning about our natural world, and to never get bored."

Regarding her time at the University of Michigan in EEB, she was Pascual’s first Ph.D. student. “My memories of U-M are all very positive, particularly my memories of interacting with the large group of population and community ecologists (Mercedes, John Vandermeer, Earl Werner, Deborah Goldberg, Aaron King) and with the complex systems group at U-M (Rick Riolo, Carl Simon, Len Sander, Bob Savit). I feel like the faculty members I interacted with, particularly Mercedes, really fostered the development of our own thoughts and ideas, and pushed critical thinking. As grad students, we were of course exposed to a lot of new material and content, but I think what was critical was not only the content to which we were exposed but our way of assessing both old and new theory with empirical data.”

She met her husband Greg Sawicki at U-M, in Rick Riolo’s complex systems class. “We were lucky enough to be able to solve the two-body problem pretty easily. I took a position in Duke Biology in 2007, and he landed a tenure-track assistant professor position in Biomedical Engineering, which is a joint program between NC State and UNC-Chapel Hill, in 2009. We live in Durham (where Duke is located), with our 3-year-old daughter Elodie and our newborn daughter Sonja. Life is great here – we both really enjoy our colleagues, our relatively short commutes (although you can’t beat commuting time in Ann Arbor), and the 60 degree February weather.”

Another alumnus who it was wonderful to hear from recently was Warren Abrahamson (B.S. Botany, '69).

“I've enjoyed reading the EEB Newsletter -- both news of current U of M folks as well as alumni,” he wrote. “The photo of Herb Wagner brought back a flush of wonderful memories from my undergraduate years at U of M including his Plant Systematics course and several weekend field trips to look for wood ferns. Herb and Florence were wonderful mentors, even though I was an undergraduate (but one who worked at the Botanical Garden for my senior thesis project). Although my primary research mentor was Otto Solbrig, Herb Wagner and I did a readings course together.”

After receiving his PhD. from Harvard in 1973, Abrahamson joined the biology faculty at Bucknell University, Lewisburg, Penn. “We had an absolutely fantastic time with Herb during his visit in the 1980s during which he presented three seminars – one to the entire campus and two within the department – and led a great field trip to "Tall Timbers" – a completely uncut old-growth stand of eastern hemlock and yellow birch. Of course, we found wood ferns, including hybrids.”

Abrahamson retired from Bucknell in 2012 after 39 years of teaching ecology and evolution, plant-animal interactions, and occasionally plant systematics. He continues the field portions of his research and as well as several collaborations. He’s particularly enjoying his Archbold Biological Station, Venus, Fla. based vegetation work in Florida scrub, the state’s most endangered ecosystem.

Abrahamson received the Archbold Biological Station's "Science and Conservation Awareness Award" in March 2014. Abrahamson, professor emeritus at Bucknell University, was honored for his transformative contributions to science and conservation in Florida. His research at Archbold explores ecosystems in fire-prone areas and demonstrates that controlled burns will eradicate invasive species while protecting the overall environment.

“Thank you for reaching out to us alumni!” he wrote. Thanks to you, Dr. Abrahamson, for getting in touch.

It is always great to hear from our alumni!  We recently heard from Peter Wilson Wilson  (B.S. Biology '58, UM M.S. Biology '60) who said, “Thanks for the compilation of photos from the EEB Honorary Photographer at Large Photo Contest.  I enjoyed looking at them as a slide show and even read some of their more detailed information giving specific location and camera information. Thanks for your good work!”

“Years ago (too many!) I enjoyed being a volunteer photographer while a student for two summers at the U-M Biological Station in Pellston. Today, I am a volunteer photographer in our national park (Cuyahoga Valley National Park) and enjoy seeing some of my photos on the park’s website and printed in their publicity mailings.”

During his graduate school days, he spent two summers at UMBS on Douglas Lake. “Alfred Stockard was the station’s director and every evening following dinner, he would announce volleyball games on the ‘quadrilateral lithoplane’ in front of the dining hall,” Wilson recalled. “On the main campus in AA his comparative anatomy class at 8 a.m. in the Nat Sci building began with his having filled the movable blackboards with pages of drawings and notes. In that day before i-technology, survival depended on having a friend that would take notes while you did the drawings and then switching off every week. Dr. Stockard had the ability to draw bilaterally symmetrical objects using both hands while he lectured.  Getting settled in your lecture hall seat by 7:45 a.m. was a necessity!”

In addition to earning his bachelors and master’s degrees, Wilson completed his Michigan teacher certification coursework. Upon graduating in 1960, he secured his first teaching job at Cranbrook School in Bloomfield Hills, Mich. 

“In today’s terms, I thought I had won the lottery. Here I was, a single guy, with my own apartment, linens and maid service, and meals provided with nothing to do but teach three to four classes each day in a well-equipped lab with an attached greenhouse and weekly dorm supervision duty. What a deal, and all for $3,500 a year! As a Detroit kid, Cranbrook was a place you took out-of-town visitors when you wanted to do an impressive tour.” He taught there for five years. " In 1961, I met and fell in love with another Cranbrook summer camp instructor, Lois Johnson (BA elementary education '64), who lived in Birmingham, Mich. We were married in December of 1963 during Christmas break and have shared a great friendship and mutual respect."

Then as part of a newly married couple, they started looking for jobs teaching at a day school.

Subsequently, he joined The Prairie School in Racine, Wisc. as a teacher/administrator, became headmaster at The Heritage School in Newnan, Ga. (just south of Atlanta), and then finished his teaching career in Akron, where he now resides, serving as headmaster of Old Trail School for 19 years. Upon retirement in 2000, he joined The Independent Schools Association of the Central States and oversaw the accreditation process of its 200 plus member schools for 11 years. Now, he concentrates on photography and has moved into the digital world.  He drives a 1931 Ford Model A Coupe in good weather and likes to wear his T-shirt that says “Still Plays With Cars” on it.

He and his wife enjoyed the ups and downs of raising three wonderful children and are now enjoying seven grandchildren. "Not quite Ozzie & Harriet," he said, "but close."

Caption: Wilson's 1931 Ford Model A Coupe with a rumble seat at the Everett Road Covered Bridge in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, one of his favorite drives.

View some highlights of Wilson's beautiful photography on Flickr.

Jon Monroe (B.S. Botany 1982) is a professor of biology at James Madison University who got his start as a botany major at the University of Michigan. 

“I switched to botany from the School of Natural Resources after being enthralled by Herb Wagner's Woody Plants class, and loved him in Systematics. I then spent three summers at the U-M Biological Station and was twice a TA for Boreal Flora taught by Ed Voss.” We heard from Monroe in response to EEB’s March 2014 enewsletter. He wrote: “To see both of them in this newsletter just made my day – thanks!”

In response to a subsequent request for his alumni news update, Monroe said, “Perhaps the most interesting and exciting thing I was involved with was a mural on our new Bioscience building. The artwork is a three-story surface view of 60 base pairs of an Arabidopsis gene (AGLU1 encoding an enzyme called alpha-glucosidase) that we sequenced back in the 90s.”

The DNA sequence is from the model plant, Arabidopsis thaliana. Alongside the DNA are sketches of organisms from the earth's surface or under water (on the first floor), organisms found in a forest canopy (on the second floor), and organisms that fly (on the third floor).

One of the undergraduates who worked on the sequencing project, Alison Stephen, is now an artist working in New York City. She drew the DNA (and surrounding organisms) based on a 3-D model that Monroe generated using the specialized computer programs 3D-DART and Chimera. Stephen’s drawing was digitized and printed on the same material they use to put images on the sides of trucks.  

Monroe received his Ph.D. in plant physiology in 1989 from Cornell University. He was a postdoctoral research associate in the Biochemistry Department at Michigan State University prior to becoming assistant professor in the Department of Biology at James Madison University. Monroe won the JMU Distinguished Faculty Award in 2011 and the American Society of Plant Biologists Excellence in Teaching award in 2001. He initiated the Council on Undergraduate Research CUR Fellow Award in 1998 and co-initiated the ASPB Summer Undergraduate Fellowships awards in 2001.

While he initially thought that maintaining a successful research program in biology without Ph.D. students was impossible, especially with JMU’s teaching loads, he said “I learned that there were many successful faculty members at colleges and universities that did wonderful work with undergraduate students. More importantly, I learned that the involvement of undergraduate students in original research was profoundly beneficial to their education.”  Over the years, he has mentored more than 50 undergraduate students, many who were coauthors on peer-reviewed papers, have completed honors theses, and have made presentations at national and regional meetings, winning best talk awards.

See a photo of the mural and read more. 

Alison Stephen Illustration blog. 

Sarah Cobey (Ph.D. EEB 2009) became an assistant professor in the Ecology and Evolution Department at the University of Chicago in July 2013. Cobey's lab researches pathogen ecology and evolution, focusing in particular on the evolutionary dynamics of host immunity and pathogen competition.

She was recently awarded a James S. McDonnell Foundation Complex Systems Scholar Award to study the evolution of antibody repertoires. 

Cobey's U-M EEB advisor was Professor Mercedes Pascual. Cobey is currently working with another Pascual Ph.D. graduate, Ed Baskerville (Ph.D. EEB 2013). He is working as a research programmer.

She is currently hiring creative, quantitative postdoctoral fellows for her lab. Read more.

Matthew Chatfield (Ph.D. EEB 2009) will begin a new position in August 2014 as assistant professor of conservation biology at Unity College, Maine. He became a research assistant professor with the Tulane/Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research in May 2013. Chatfield is responsible for the infrastructure and program development of the Riverfront Campus project, which aims to restore and protect the coast of New Orleans and its sister communities across the Mississippi River delta. As part of the project, Tulane will host a Center of Excellence in downtown New Orleans for coastal protection and restoration. “By significantly increasing capacity for coastal applied sciences and engineering, the campus will help transform New Orleans into a leading hub for green jobs, infrastructure and technologies,” states the Tulane University website.

Although he was extensively involved with freshwater ecosystems in the past, Chatfield’s current research interests are in coastal ecology and restoration. Previously, he worked as a postdoctoral fellow with Cori Richards (Ph.D. EEB 2008) at Tulane University. After that, he was a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Tulane teaching a large course called Diversity of Life and a small seminar course.

Chatfield's U-M EEB advisors were Professors Priscilla Tucker and Ronald Nussbaum.

We were happy to hear from Margaret Gray Towne (B.S. Biology 1961, M.S. Biology 1962) in response to a recent enewsletter. “I was a tour guide in the Museum of Natural History from 1958-1962 and worked for Dr. Henry van der Schalie in the Mollusk Division during those same years. He really influenced me. I received two degrees in biology from the University of Michigan and got my doctorate from the Montana State University,” she wrote.

Towne’s dissertation was titled:  “The Influence of Critical Thinking on Christians Belief and Belief Change with Reference to the Polarities of Creationism and Organic Evolution.” She wrote a book: Honest to Genesis: A Biblical and Scientific Challenge to Creationism. Towne also attended Princeton Theological Seminary and has taught biology and courses on reasoning and critical thinking over the years at many universities. 

She is retired now. “The University of Michigan meant soooo much to me. It is GREAT to read about all that is going on in the EEB department.” 

Read more about Honest to Genesis:
Amazon and on an Evolutionary Christianity blog

Dr. Huabin Zhao, a former EEB postdoctoral fellow, is now a professor of zoology in the Department of Zoology at Wuhan University, China. He is teaching zoology for undergraduates and molecular evolution / molecular ecology for graduate students.

“My research is focusing on molecular evolution, molecular ecology and molecular phylogenetics as well as comparative genomics in animals, such as mammals (e.g. marine mammals and subterranean rodents) and insects (e.g. fireflies and butterflies),” he wrote. While at U-M, Zhao worked in thelab of Professor Jianzhi Zhang.

Former EEB postdoctoral fellow, Kenneth Elgersma, began a tenure-track position at the University of Northern Iowa in the fall of 2013. Elgersma is teaching biostatistics and an introductory biology lab. 

“I’m excited to do more teaching because of how much I enjoyed teaching as a graduate student and as a postdoc at U-M,” Elgersma said. “I've also really enjoyed my time at the Biological Station while I've been here, it has great infrastructure for conducting research, so I'm exploring ways to continue and expand my research there as I start my new position in Iowa.”

He is planning to spend time this summer beginning his research on natural greenhouse gas emissions from wetlands and adjacent grasslands and agricultural fields in Iowa, and how that changes when non-native plants invade. 

Elgersma’s mentor at U-M was Professor Deborah Goldberg.

M. Jahi Chappell (Ph.D. EEB 2009) is the new director of agriculture policy for the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy in Minneapolis, Minn.

 IATP is an almost 30-year-old organization advocating for sustainable and just farm, food, and trade policies. “Our goal is to support healthy and environmentally sound agricultural systems that serve food citizens while giving farmers a fair deal premised on the reconnection, respect, and support they deserve,” Chappell said.

“I'll be responsible for shaping and guiding our policy analyses, organizational positions, and projects related to the food and agriculture system within the United States in cooperation with colleagues leading our initiatives in international governance and trade and in food systems. This includes work building the science of agroecology into the mainstream narrative about food and farming systems and their environmental impacts, and projects advocating for the decentralization and democratization of food and farm systems.”

Read more about Chappell on his IATP webpage. 

He recently presented at the World Food Prize. View the speech in English and in Portuguese.

Javier Ruiz (Ph.D. EEB 2008) is director of the Biodiversity Project, Nicaragua, a research initiative conducting research in Eastern Nicaragua, and a visiting scholar at Bluefields Indian and Caribbean University (2008 to present). 

Ruiz is collaborating with Professor John Vandermeer, U-M EEB, and Dr. Íñigo Granzow-de la Cerda (University of Barcelona, Spain, a former assistant research scientist at U-M EEB) on the study of the regenerating hurricane forests of Eastern Nicaragua.

They are documenting how tropical rainforests regenerate after hurricanes and the resulting fallen trees in closed forest canopies. Their results can be found in two recent publications: Science Direct and the International Journal of Tropical Biology and Conservation.

Previously, Ruiz was visiting scholar in Professor Rodolfo Dirzo’s Lab at Stanford University from February 2012 to May 2012, where he started a collaborative effort with Dirzo to understand the dynamics of rodent species on emerging infectious diseases in humans in Latin America.

They conducted a literature review that is being submitted for revision, and they are developing analytical models to detect and understand the dynamics of these diseases and the implications for human health. This work was funded by a fellowship from the InterAmerican Network of Academies of Sciences and the U.S. Department of State.

Read more on Ruiz's website.

We heard from Undine Jost Zengel (B.Sc. Biology 1984) who wrote this about an article on the Museum of Zoology move in the September 2012 EEB enewsletter: “Thank you so much for this newsletter! The article on moving the collection is particularly interesting to me as my student job was to check both the fluid and bone collections against the old volumes of data. I also worked on numbering bat bones (they have a lot, and very tiny!) as a student and spent many, many hours in the field museum.”

This email got her back in touch with one of her former professors, Phil Myers, who was excited to reestablish a connection with his former curatorial assistant.

Jost Zengel recalls that Walter Cronkite spoke in the stadium at her graduation from U-M. She earned her MBA and MA from Tulane University, New Orleans. She used to be involved with a U-M alumni group 20 years ago, but it broke apart so she was happy to make a connection with her alma mater again.

Over the years, Jost Zengel has worked for Lykes Brothers, an international cargo shipping company, the state Department of Environmental Quality, and in international industrial marketing for Intralox, a large multinational conveyor belt manufacturer. "For the past 11 years, I've been a full-time mom raising my now 13, 11, and 9-year-olds and managing our family. Our oldest is going into high school next year which is a whole new 'ballgame.'"

Ryan Bebej (Ph.D. EEB 2011) accepted a position as assistant professor in the Biology Department at his alma mater, Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich. He’ll be teaching courses in anatomy, physiology, and evolution beginning in the fall of 2012. “I plan to continue collaborating with folks in the Museum of Paleontology at U-M and will be getting undergraduate students at Calvin involved in those research projects,” Bebej said.

Aley Joseph (M.S. EEB 2010, M.P.H. Epidemiology 2011) graduated from the University of Michigan School of Public Health in December 2011 (MPH Epidemiology). She was hired as an epidemiologist in January 2012 for the California Rural Indian Health Board, a health research and consulting company that was founded by and serves rural Native American tribes in California.

“I am coordinating an NIH-funded dental health intervention study right now. It has been great so far," said Joseph.

The California Rural Indian Health Board was formed to provide a central focal point in the Indian health field in California for planning, advocacy, funding, training, technical assistance, coordination, fundraising, education, development and for the purpose of promoting unity and formulating common policy on Indian health care issues.

Sophia Holley Ellis (B.A. Biology and German 1949, M.S. Botany 1950, M.A. German 1964) retired in June 2006 after 56 years as a biology and German teacher in the Detroit Public Schools. Over the years, she has privately funded several students’ college education. Now, through a $25,000 gift creating the Sophia Holley Ellis Scholarship endowment, Ellis will extend her support to students with financial need in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts – with priority given to students from the Detroit Public Schools. The scholarship was established in June 2009 with the first one awarded during academic year 2011-2012.

“The University is the reason I am,” said Ellis. “When I came to campus I had never used a telephone, never seen a movie or been to a restaurant. As a young black girl, if it hadn’t been for the U-M, I wouldn’t have had the chance to do so many things. I hope this scholarship will bring kids like me to Michigan—students who are smart but just wouldn’t have the money to come to our great school otherwise—the kids who are dreamers.”

Antoyrie Green, the first student to receive the Ellis Scholarship said that this award meant so much to her for two reasons: “how much of burden it took off of my parents when I received the scholarship” and “how inspirational Sophia and her story are.”

“I love to compare Sophia and her scholarship to a ram in the bush,” referring to a bible verse. “I didn't know how I was going to get the last bit of money to pay for school, but God blessed me with that scholarship and I will be forever thankful!

“As a black woman on the campus of the University of Michigan, I am inspired to hear stories like Sophia's. Stories of black women who came before me, defied all the odds, and pursued (and reached) their dreams only push me to do the same. 

“As for my future, I plan on becoming a clinical psychologist for children, hopefully in Detroit. After learning about Sophia and her career as a teacher in Detroit, I can only image the huge impact she has had on her students. I hope that I am able to impact the life of someone half as much as she did and that one day, my story will inspire someone just as her story has inspired me!”

Through the years, Ellis also taught earth science, horticulture, physical science, and ecology when it was a brand new discipline. Ellis taught in kindergarten classrooms, elementary, middle and high schools up to Wayne County Community College.

The world was a different place when a bright, energetic, young Sophia Holley Ellis was a student at the University of Michigan in the 1940s and 50s. At 85 years young, she has many wonderful memories and stories.

Ellis was the first African American to study at the U-M Biological Station. She recalls her pantomime on skit night when she acted out washing an imaginary grown male African elephant using a stepladder, pail of water, bar of soap and towel. “I thoroughly 'washed' every anatomical part of that elephant and the zoologists roared with laughter,” she recalls fondly.

She was a modern dancer and a ballerina at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theater in performances throughout her undergraduate and graduate years, including the Marriage of Figaro, Barber of Seville, Carmen and Coppélia. But her participation was not without some controversy. Theater administration at the time wanted her off the stage because she was black. The coordinator of the dance program, Esther Pease, threatened to take the whole ensemble off the stage. “I really admired Esther for that,” said Ellis.  

Even so, the young dancer had to make herself up to look white, with opaque leotards, grease paint on her hands, makeup and even putty on her nose. She didn’t mind – she thought of it as acting. “I felt sorry for people who were racist,” she said. “When churches didn’t allow me in, I knew that God wasn’t there.”

Originally, Ellis dreamed of becoming a world renowned scientist, inventing cures that would eradicate society’s ills and ailments, according to an article in The Michigan Citizen. When she told her godfather, Victor Julius Tulane (U-M M.S., Ph.D. 1932-34) that she wanted to be a research biologist like him, he told her to learn German, get all As and attend the University of Michigan. Her mother searched through static and found the German-American hour on the radio. In that era, the greatest scientists were German.

Her Northern High School counselors couldn’t grasp the idea that a “little black girl” wanted to go to college. Upon graduation they told her they’d find her a job— as a maid. Uninterested in that profession, Ellis attended the University of Michigan on a full academic scholarship where she said “the world opened” and she decided to be a teacher. In 1950s Detroit, black teachers, regardless of what classes they were certified to teach, were confined to certain schools. Ellis remembers being told by school administrators, “It’s best you teach your own kind.”

Ellis has come a long way since those days. She was named the Phyllis Layton Perry Educator of Year in 2006 by the National Council of International Visitors (NCIV), U.S. State Department.In 2012, Ellis was named a Citizen Diplomat by the NCIV, which honors an individual or institution who, motivated by a deep understanding of world issues and a commitment to the exchange of persons and ideas, has achieved a recognized standard of excellence in furthering the cause of international and mutual understanding. She is included in a booket called "A Tribute to Citizen Diplomats,” in which she is quoted along with famous people such as Dwight D. Eisenhower, Bill Clinton, Condoleezza Rice, Mohandas Ghandi, Roman Herzog, and many more. For her efforts toward improving the U.S.-German relationship, Ellis received the German Federal Republic’s highest citizen award, the Federal Cross of Merit (Bundesverdienstkreuz) in 1995.

Ellis is never bored. Up until recently, she taught German and piano. She’s currently studying Arabic, attends the symphony, loves to read, play the piano, and she even knows a little Russian. And, “all the while, I’ve kept on dancing,” Ellis said.

Prosanta Chakrabarty (Ph.D. EEB 2006) recently wrote a book called, "A Guide to Academia: Getting into and surviving grad school, postdocs and a research job," published by Wiley. It is now available on Amazon.

“I started writing the book as a little side project without much intention of it being anything but a little pamphlet reference to give to undergrads and grad students,” Chakrabarty said. “I wanted to put all the advice I was given by lots of good people (mostly at Michigan) onto paper. I had about 50 or so pages when I was approached by an editor for Wiley at a scientific conference who wanted to know if I had any ideas for books. (He sought me out because of some of the press I was getting during the oil spill in Louisiana.)

"I showed him my draft and he and I hashed out a plan to publish the book once I expanded it to include the entire academic landscape - from undergrad to tenure. I'm happy with the outcome and I think it will help students trying to figure out each step of the academic process from getting into graduate school and doing well there to getting a job in academia. I think students at Michigan will especially benefit since a lot of what I write about happened to me there. Michigan folks like Bill Fink, Jerry Smith, Deborah Goldberg, Marc Ammerlann (and many others) taught me a great deal about the academic process and a lot of their wisdom is on these pages.”

His book received a glowing review June 8, 2012, in the journal Science. Chakrabarty is assistant professor and curator of fishes at Louisiana State University, Museum of Natural Science in Baton Rouge.

After her graduation from the University of Michigan, Mindy Streem (B.S. Biology 2001, B.M.A. Voice Performance 2001, M.S. Rackham Orthodontics) attended the Harvard School of Dental Medicine and graduated with a D.M.D. in 2005. She then returned to U-M for her residency in orthodontics through the Rackham Graduate School. In 2008, she got her M.S. in orthodontics from Rackham. Since that time, she moved to Solon, Ohio, where she started an orthodontic practice called Streem Orthodontics. She lives in Solon with her husband, Jason, (a 2005 graduate of U-M Dental School and a periodontist), and her son, Sam, who was born in October 2010. She is due with her second child in July 2012.

After completing his doctoral dissertation in August 1960, Richard Hanlin (Ph.D. Botany/Mycology 1961), professor emeritus, accepted a position as mycologist in the Department of Plant Pathology of the Georgia Experiment Station in Griffin, a unit of the University of Georgia College of Agriculture. Hanlin conducted research on plant pathogenic ascomycetes. In 1967, he moved to the main campus in Athens and added teaching and mentoring graduate students to his research duties. Later in his career, he developed collaborative research projects in Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico and other countries. Hanlin retired in June 2001 after 41 years' service. Since that time he has continued to work as a volunteer in the Mycological Herbarium of the Georgia Museum of Natural History and he regularly attends the Mycological Society of America meetings.

Maggie Morris (B.S. Biology 1995) received a Junior Faculty Award from the American Diabetes Association for her grant entitled "The role of macrophage 12/15-lipoxygenase in the innate autoimmune responses of type 1 diabetes" in the summer of 2011. “I received this news just one week before the birth of our second daughter,” said Morris. “It's been an exciting summer for me, to say the least! All the best as you lead the EEB into its second decade!” she wrote to Professor and Chair Deborah Goldberg. 

Dr. Morris is an assistant professor of research in the Department of Internal Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School.

Jonathan Nelson Wu (M.S. Biology 1990) is assistant dean for academic programs at Temple University, Japan Campus. He teaches introductory courses in biology and mathematics.

Gail McCormick (B.S. Biology/EEB concentration 2010, B.T.A. Theatre Arts) is a Ph.D. candidate in the ecology program at Penn State. She also has an unusual artistic flair for paper cutting and all things paper.

According to a blog post on All Things Paper by Ann Martin, McCormick began making collage-like birthday cards while in college and was hooked. This led to more complex designs. “I think it's pretty incredible Gail can capture so much expression by layering cut pieces of paper,” writes Martin.

You can see McCormick’s artwork on her website Gail McCormick | Paper Cutting  including birds, animals, people, mandalas and even super heroes! Read Ann Martin’s blog post.

Elephant paper cut by Gail McCormick

Dr. David Alonso, former postdoctoral fellow in Professor Mercedes Pascual’s lab, was awarded a Ramon y Cajal Fellowship from the Spanish Government in 2010. Alonso is an assistant research professor at the Institute for Advanced Studies of Blanes (CEAB), part of the Spanish Institution of Scientific Research (CSIC). He moved back to Spain in July 2011 to start the five-year position. The CSIC has several ecology centers across Spain; the Biological Station of Donana in Sevilla is best known worldwide. “Blanes is a smaller center with potential to grow,” he said. “I am looking forward to contributing to the findings and research of this center.”

After his postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Michigan, he had a three-year postdoctoral VENI fellowship from the Dutch Institution for Scientific Research (NWO) at the University of Groningen. “While in Groningen, I worked in the Conservation and Community Ecology (COCON) group directed by Dr. Han Olff,” Alonso said. “There I have been involved in a variety of projects involving stochastic descriptions of community dynamics and ecological networks and ranging from large herbivore ecology in savanna ecosystems to the role of natural enemies in the dynamics of biodiversity in rainforests.”

Alonso frequently visits U-M EEB to maintain a fruitful collaboration with Pascual and Professor Annette Ostling.

Dr. Judith Bronstein (M.S. EEB 1981, Ph.D. EEB 1986) has been selected as a University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona. This is the highest honor awarded by the university to faculty members with outstanding records of creative scholarship and exceptional contributions to teaching, advising and mentoring of undergraduate students. Bronstein’s Ph.D. dissertation was titled  “Coevolution and constraints in a neotropical fig-pollinator wasp mutualism.” Her advisor was Professor Beverly Rathcke.